Police: Store clerk offered customer money for sex

WINCHESTER, Ind. – Authorities said a clerk at a Randolph County convenience store repeatedly offered a customer money – in one instance, $500 – to have sex with him.

Lynn police said they placed a hidden recording device on the woman after she reported the initial incident to them, and recorded her subsequent encounters with the store employee, 53-year-old Dinesh K. Patel.

On Tuesday, they arrested Patel – who reportedly lives in a house on the same property as the Marathon convenience store at 101 N. Main St. in Lynn – on preliminary charges of promoting prostitution, a Level 5 felony carrying up to six years in prison, and patronizing a prostitute, a misdemeanor.

According to an affidavit, the woman said Patel first offered her $500 to have sex with him when she went to the store on July 26 to buy gum and cigarettes.

She said her bill that day was approximately $8, and after she gave the clerk – who repeatedly referred to her as “sexy” – a $10 bill, he gave her $8 in change.

The woman told officers she was willing to return to the store with a recording device “if it would get a pervert off the street,” the document said.

When she returned to the store on July 30, Patel again offered her money for sex – this time $75 – and asked if she “liked to party.” The woman said he did not charge her for items she had intended to buy, including cigarettes.

That encounter was recorded, as was another on Aug. 1 and a third on Tuesday, when Patel allegedly offered the woman $50 “for two hours with her in his house,” officers wrote.

Authorities also allege Patel fondled himself while talking to the woman.

Taken into custody Tuesday, the store clerk at first “would only tell parts of the story,” the report said. After being shown video footage of the encounters, he acknowledged offering the customer up to $500 for sex.

Randolph County Prosecutor David Daly’s office on Wednesday was given until Monday to file formal charges in the case.

Court records reflect no prior charges against Patel, who was being held in the Randolph County jail under a cash bond of $800.

Douglas Walker is a news reporter at The Star Press. Contact him at 765-213-5851 or at dwalker@muncie.gannett.com.